1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to inventory management utilizing unattended secure facilities and more particularly to systems and methods for the distribution of service parts from a supplier to a user and for the return of parts from the user to a supplier or other entities utilizing unattended facilities.
2. Description of the Related Art
Technicians (such as computer repair technicians) often require new parts in order to complete a particular repair. Inventory management services were developed to supply technicians with parts. Generally, in the past, when a technician needed a new part, the worker would request the part from a warehouse, travel to the warehouse, pick up the part at an attended distribution counter within the warehouse, travel to the place where the part was needed, and then install the part. In other instances, the part may be ordered and upon arrival “cross-docked” at a facility controlled by an inventory management service and be picked up at the facility by the technician. In some instances, ordered parts may be held for pick-up at an attended inventory management service facility. In yet other instances, the inventory management service may have the ordered part couriered to the technician.
The parts distribution methods described above have several drawbacks. First, these methods may require technicians to travel to a warehouse each time they need a new part, which can be inconvenient and time consuming. Alternatively, a courier picking up the required part from a warehouse and meeting the technician at a designated location may cause added courier costs and delay time while the technician waits to meet the courier. Moreover, if the courier and the technician fail to meet, it may cause a service failure. Second, the parts distribution method described above only allows technicians to pick up parts when the attended warehouse is staffed and open for business or requires extra expense or extraordinary arrangements for “after-hours” pickup. Third, because the warehouses are often busy, technicians often have to wait in line before receiving their requested parts from a warehouse representative, thus further delaying the repair.
To address some of the problems with the parts distribution method described above, system and methods were devised for technicians to pick up parts at an attended warehouse by providing a set of lockers that can be used for distributing parts without the assistance of a warehouse representative. Typically, after a technician calls such a company to request a certain part, a warehouse worker places the requested part into an unattended locker. The locker may be within a computer-controlled bank of secure lockers. When the technician arrives at the bank of lockers, the worker preferably uses a keypad at the bank of lockers to enter access information (e.g., the technician's User ID, PIN, or an appropriate order number) into the bank of lockers. In response to the user entering the proper access information, the locker containing the technician's part is unlocked allowing the technician to pick up the requested part.
Although such locker systems reduced some problems with early warehouse part distribution systems (such as waiting in line and only being able to access the parts when the distribution center is staffed), there are still many problems associated with these systems. For example, these systems still require a user or a courier to travel to a warehouse to pick up the parts. In addition, they require warehouse workers to move parts from the warehouse to the lockers each time a part is ordered. Furthermore, such systems do not provide for a convenient method of allowing users to return damaged or unused parts or, if such parts are returned, the returning technician may need to obtain some form of authorization prior to dropping off the returned part at the unattended facility.
Other forms of unattended distribution systems are also known in the art. For instance, U.S. Pat. No. 6,010,064 issued on Jan. 4, 2000 to Umeda et al., (“the '064 patent”), generally discloses an unattended commodity distributing locker apparatus whereby commodities are dropped off by a customer, processed by a service company, and returned to the locker after processing by the service company. More specifically, the '064 patent contemplates a customer entering certain information into the system by either a keypad or a membership card. The system then prints a bar-coded label that is placed with the item in the locker. Upon pick up by the service company, the bar-coded label is scanned to identify the commodity. After processing, the items are returned to the locker system by the service company. The customer then enters the membership card or other personal information to retrieve the processed items from the lockers. By entering a membership card or certain personal information into the system the customer is associated with a processed item.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,344,796 issued on Feb. 5, 2002 to Ogilvie et al., (“the '796 patent”), discloses an unattended cross-docking system whereby local shippers can exchange custody of goods with regional or national shippers to achieve better transportation economics. The '796 patent provides for a facility and method that can be used by businesses and individuals for receipt and storage of goods without requiring them to be present at the time of delivery. It also provides a facility and method for businesses and individuals to leave goods for pick-up by a shipper. The system provides notification and an access code to a local shipper when items are left in storage. Such notification may be by voice message, fax or e-mail. Another embodiment of this reference discloses a system whereby the storage devices are placed at some convenient location along the routes where consumers drive home. This bank of storage devices serves as a depot to receive shipments from multiple vendors and permit pickup by consumers.
The above-described systems generally provide a one to one relationship where a technician will place an order for one or more parts, the order is delivered to an unattended facility by a shipper or parts service, depending upon the number and size of the parts associated with the order the parts may be placed in one or more secure unattended enclosures at the unattended facility and the technician receives a separate notification for each part that is placed in a separate enclosure. These multiple notifications for a single order are often inconvenient and confusing for the technician ordering the part as well as increasing the messaging traffic. The technician will then travel to the unattended secure location to retrieve the parts.
Unattended drop off facilities are secure facilities where parts that are intended to be returned to an inventory management service are placed until pick up by the inventory management service or its agents (i.e., commercial couriers, shippers or shipping services). When returning unused, used or damaged parts, some prior art systems generally required a technician to first await receipt of some form of authorization before placing the parts in an unattended drop off facility. An inventory management service generally receives the returned part in its warehouse before information about the returned part may be entered into its return parts system to begin the return parts processing.
Therefore, systems and methods are needed to address the challenges associated with expediting parts retrieval and parts return, notifying a technician that a part or order is ready to be picked up, decreasing a technician's travel time to retrieve or return a service part and expediting the processing of returned parts.